The following is a
lecture presented by the author, on February 9, 2011.

Introduction

On Friday, December 17, 2010,
a 26-year-old fruit seller, called Muhammed Bou 'Azizi, set
himself on fire in front of the Sidi Bouzaid regional council in central
Tunisia, in protest against
the Tunisian regime's economic and security brutality. He was unemployed
despite his education. When he attempted to make a living by selling
vegetables and fruits in the streets, he was faced with the police corruption,
humiliation, and brutality.

His tragic act of protest triggered similar acts by two other youngmen
also in the same city. The first electrocuted himself on a pylon and the
second jumped into a well and drowned.

Protests erupted all over the Arab state, culminating in the police killing
of scores and injuring hundreds of protesters, which triggered more protests
until the police force collapsed. The dictator, Zain Al-'Abideen BinAli (also written with French
spelling as Zine Al-Abidine Bin Ali), fled to Saudi Arabia, on January 15,
after ruling the country for 23 years, fearing execution by the angry
masses. (1)

On Sunday, January 16,
2011, in neighboring Algeria,
a 37-year-old firefighter also set himself on fire, in a village near the
eastern Tunisian border, inspired by Bou 'Azizi. He died hours later in the
hospital. Three other Algerians set themselves on fire in protest. These were Senouci Touat, Mohsen Bouterfif, and Mohamed Aouichia. Demonstrations broke
out throughout Algeria, sparked by these incidents but in anger against
unemployment and poverty. Several protesters were killed and injured in
confrontations with the police (2).

On Monday, January 17, 2011, an
Egyptian man set himself on fire in front of the Parliament,
in protest against poverty and brutality of the security forces. On Friday,
January 21, 2011, the unemployed 35-year-old Egyptian man, Salah Sa'ad
Mahmoud, set himself on fire in the middle of a Cairo street, before being
put out by bystanders. He was the tenth Egyptian youngman to do so because
of unemployment, poverty, and blocked opportunities. (3)

Inspired by
the success of the Tunisian revolution, the Egyptian people took to the
streets in Cairo, on Tuesday, January 25,
2011, protesting against poverty and brutality of the
security forces. They were faced with fierce crack down by security forces,
which resulted in killing hundreds and injuring thousands of protests, in
less than two weeks. The
Egyptian people escalated their protests to include major cities in the
country at the same time, leading to the collapse of the security forces,
change of government, appointment of a vice president (a long standing
demand), and an announcement from
the dictator, Hosni Mubarak,
that he and his son are not going to run for election again. The protesters have insisted
that their goal is changing the regime, starting with deposing the dictator.
Post-script note: The revolution has achieved its initial goal of deposing
the dictator and his deputy on February 11, 2011.
(4)

Encouraged by the Tunisian revolution, Jordanians also took to the streets
denouncing the government for the sharp rise of prices, poverty, and
unemployment. One of the largest of these protests was on Friday,
January 21, 2011, but it was
preceded by several smaller protests and followed by protests on every Friday. King Abdullah II
responded by sacking the government and appointing a new prime minister with
a mandate to address people's grievances. (5)

Yemenis organized two
major protests in Sana'a and other cities, on January 28, 2011 and February
3, 2011 against the dictatorial regime of Ali Abdullah Saleh, who responded
by a promise not to run again for election and not to allow his son to run.
However, protests have continued but with less intensity, expressing support
for the Tunisian and Egyptian revolutions. (6)

Even
in
Saudi Arabia, on
February 5, 2011, there was a
protest in front of the Ministry of Interior in Riyadh, organized by women
who demanded the release of their relatives, who are political prisoners.
Officials from the Ministry came out and talked to them, telling them that
the issue will be taken care of by courts. Moreover, there has been a Facebook
campaign demanding that the country become a constitutional monarchy instead
of the present absolute rule (7)

What may make Saudi Arabia a
candidate for the first revolution in the Gulf states is the existence of a
long history of opposition to the royal family since the beginning of the
twentieth century. At present, the Reform Movement and its leader, Sa'ad Al-Faqeeh,
who airs TV broadcasts from London, leads opposition to the Saudi regime.
The Movement has been successful in organizing protests in several mosques
in different areas of the country. The Saudi Reformists have been ecstatic
lately after seeing their brothers and sisters in Tunisia and Egypt, who
succeeded in throwing up the dictatorial regimes there.

In
Kuwait, the Emir ordered the distribution of thousands of
Kuwaiti Dinars to citizens, in an attempt to prevent any protests for
economic reasons. However, tensions are still high over there, as a result of the
police crack down against law makers and citizens who were attending a
political rally, despite the resignation of the scandalous Interior
Minister. The

also started to demonstrate demanding their right to be recognized as
citizens in their country. (8)

In Bahrain, the Shi'i
majority activists have been encouraged by the spirit of the Arab revolution
and came out demanding a regime change, to make their country a
constitutional monarchy instead of the current regime. (9)

In Libya, another
oil-exporting Arab state, people came out demanding an end to the
dictatorial regime of Gaddafi, who ruled them brutally for forty-two years.
By February 19, 2011, about one hundred Libyans were killed in protests by
the security forces, particularly in Bani Ghazi and other eastern cities.
The protests also broke out in Tripoli and other western cities, indicating
that Libyans are united against the Gaddafi regime. (10)

Finally, Lebanon
and Palestine have been in
continuous state of unrest as a result of Israeli wars, attacks,
assassinations, blockade and siege of Gaza, and the continuous occupation of
the West Bank.

What does all this mean?

It means that Arabs are in revolt
against the dictatorial regimes imposed on them, all of which are backed and
supported by the US and its EU allies for no other reasons than
keeping the
peace with Israel. The objective is to keep the Zionist state as the
dominant and hegemonic power in the oil-rich region.

The Western
governments, which are backing the Arab dictatorial regimes, never cared about the
poverty of the people or the repression and brutality inflicted on them by
these regimes. To the contrary, Western governments cooperated and
collaborated with the dictatorial Arab regimes, providing them with the
military and security assistance, which enabled them to control Arabs for
decades. The result has been abject poverty, oppression, and horrendous
violation of all human rights.

Some Basic
Facts: Poverty in Oil-Rich Lands

The
basic facts about Arab states mentioned in
Table 1 below show that Arabs are mainly in their young
adultood, in their twenties. This means that they need education first and
jobs after that. They will be angry if they cannot get jobs which enable
them to be independent of their parents, get married, and buy the basic
commodities available to their counterparts in other world regions.

The internet has opened the gates of knowledge about the world for educated
youngmen and youngwomen around the world. It has enabled them to know about
what's going on for their counterparts in other societies, which leads them
to demand similar treatment and privileges.

Table 1 also shows that
the Arab unemployment rate is about ten percent, except for Libya and Yemen,
where it is in the thirties. Apparently, statistics about unemployment in
the table are too low, not because they maybe so, but because official Arab
statistics maybe doctored for propaganda purposes. These statistics may also
represent only those who report unemployment to the government, something
unusual to hear about in the Middle East. Finally, most Arab women do not
work, meaning that unemployment rate is much much higher than the reported
ten percent.

Statistics about those living below the poverty
level show that a lot of Arabs are living in poverty, whether because of
unemployment or because of low wages. This is particularly the case with
Egypt and Algeria, where poverty level exceeds 20 percent, while it exceeds
40 percent in Yemen.

If high rates of poverty and unemployment in
large Arab states are accompanied by less democratic practices, more
corruption, less or no press freedom, and long-lasting dictatorships, then
this is the recipe for revolutions. Table 2
shows us statistics ranking the Arab states on these variables.

Basically, wealthy Arab states have less corruption, lower poverty, and
lower unemployment rates. The dictatorial regimes of these states count on
the material comfort of their citizen to outweigh their discontent due to
the lack of democracy and the restricted freedom of expression. This
explains the less likelihood of protests or revolutions in the oil-wealthy
states with small populations.

Concerning poor Arab states, such as
Tunisia, Egypt, Yemen, and Jordan, people have been protesting because the
dictatorial regimes have not only suppressed their freedoms but also starved
them. At the same time, citizens can see the outrageous wealth amassed by
the ruling families and their surrounding cronies, through corruption,
monopolies, and collaboration with rulers of the Zionist Empire.

Thus, revolutions in the poor Arab states represent a logical outcome of an
illogical arrangement imposed on them by their local regimes and their
Zionist masters.

Concerning Arabs living in large but wealthy
states, like Algeria, they are not going to accept poverty or dictatorship.
They will follow the first group of revolutions in poor states. This is
clear by the many protests and demonstration breaking out throughout
Algeria.

Even in wealthy Arab states, like Saudi Arabia and
Libya, there have been several indications of opposition groups, and even
protests. In these states, people are not going to accept minimum life
conditions, or even material comforts of the middle class, while seeing the
ruling families and their surrounding cronies amassing millions and billions
of dollars. The educated members of middle classes are going to demand more
freedoms and more participation in the political process. Their turn will be
third, after the first two groups.

The last group of Arab states to
have revolutions or protests are the Gulf states, which have small
populations, enjoying a high standard of living, and are among the highest
in the world in per capita income. The royal
families in these states are directly protected by NATO forces, which occupy the
Gulf region. However, protests have started in Kuwait, by the Bidoons and
the political activists, and in Bahrain, by the Shi'i majority activists
demanding more participation in governance.Why are Arabs so poor
despite their oil wealth?The vast majority of Arabs have been living in
abject poverty despite the huge oil wealth and other resources they have.
The following are just the main factors that may explain this illogical
phenomenon.

First, most of Arab revenues have been spent on the
military and security establishments. The objective is making sure that the
dictatorial Arab regimes, republics and monarchies alike, are doing their major job, protecting the borders
of the headquarters of the Zionist Empire, the racist, apartheid, Zionist
state of Israel. This military and security spending has been on the expense of investments in
the human capital
and economic development.

Second, a great deal of Arab revenues in
poor Arab states are consumed by the interests paid as services to foreign debts, which
leaves little or no revenues to be spent on investments and economic
development.

Third, the dictatorial Arab regimes have been
characterized by ugly levels of corruption. The ruling families and the
classes benefiting from them have been amassing their vast wealth from
giving themselves monopolies in production, importing, and distribution of
strategic commodities. This leaves the rest of the population receiving
poverty-level or below poverty-level wages, which are not enough to pay for
the basic necessities of life. The result is the spread of corruption among
members of the lower classes, in the private and public sectors alike, in
the form of exacting bribes for services they are already paid for to do.

Fourth, all Arab dictatorial regimes, in all Arab states, have
crippled their populations with endless number of bureaucratic rules, which
are officially intended to regulate the economy for the benefit of society
as a whole. However, these rules are not adhered to by the corrupt members
of the ruling wealthy classes, who control or bribe government employees. At
the same time, these bureaucratic rules have been blocking the way of the
entrepreneurs from the rest of the population, who find themselves
frustrated, helpless, and without any assistance from the government.

Fifth, the oil wealth
is concentrated in states which have small populations, while states with
large populations have no or less oil reserves. This was an arrangement by
the British empire, which controlled the Arabian Peninsula, according to the
Sykes-Pico agreement with France in 1916. The European imperialist powers
created the artificial entities, they called states, namely Palestine,
Jordan, and Lebanon in the north as well as the six states of the Gulf Cooperation Council
in the east, namely Kuwait, Bahrain,
Qatar, UAE, Oman, and Saudi Arabia. With the exception of Saudi Arabia, the
citizens of of these Gulf states are only few hundreds of thousands. This leaves
the huge Arab oil wealth in the hands of the corrupt members of the ruling
families, who have deposited a great deal of it in the US-EU banks and spent
major amounts of it on buying military and security equipment from NATO
countries, particularly US and UK, which protect them.

The partition
of the Arab nation by the European imperialist powers, then the actual
protection of the ruling families in the oil-rich states by these powers, has led to the
awkward situation of overpopulated Arab states with little or no oil
reserves and under-populated and tiny Arab states with a vast oil wealth. In
addition, the imperialist Western powers have continued the depletion of
resources of the Arab states directly during the colonial era and
indirectly after independence, through wars, invasions, occupation, and
imposed military and security spending.

In order for the ruling families and their cronies to maintain their tight
grip on the population, they have imposed a tight regime of border crossing,
travel, work, and residence, to prevent Arabs from traveling freely from one Arab state to
another in their homeland. The visa system made sure that only a very small number of people
will be able to travel from one state to another. This led thousands of
Arab youngmen, particularly from the North African Arab states, to risk their life to reach
European shores as illegal immigrants to find work. Moreover, rulers of the
wealthy Arab states invented the Kafeel (Patron) system, which gives
employers in these states rights over their employees (Arab and non-Arabs) that can be
compared to the rights of salve masters over their slaves in the 19th
century.

In essence, poverty is imposed on Arabs as a result of
the European imperialist partition of the Arab nation and the creation of sovereign states,
military and security spending, keeping the oil wealth in the hands of a
small number of people, corruption on various levels, international
debt, rigid bureaucracy, and controlling the masses as protection of the
headquarters of the Zionist Empire, the so-called state of Israel.

Theoretical Explanations:Arabs Revolting Against Brutal Regimes of the
Zionist Empire

Arab revolutions against the brutal regimes,
imposed on them by the Zionist
Empire, can also be explained by the main sociological theories.

1. The functional Theory

The functional sociological theory perceives society as composed
of functioning social institutions. If one or more of these institutions
are dysfunctioning, then a state of disorder and instability happens in
society until these institutions are repaired and become functioning
again (Spencer, Parsons).

Thus, functionalists may explain Arab revolutions against the
dictatorial regimes in the Middle East as a result of dysfunctioning
institutions, in this case
the two major social institutions of the economy and the government. The
economies of Arab regimes produced in extreme poverty and blocked
opportunities for Arab citizens, particularly educated youngmen and
youngmen. Moreover, the corrupt rulers abused their control over Arab
governments, staying in power for decades and denying people their
rights for freedom, free expression, assembly, and participation in
decision making. Then, the failure of these two institutions to do
what's expected from them led to Arab revolutions.

2. The Conflict Theory

The conflict perspective gives credit to Karl Marx, who argued that
there is a conflict in society between the capitalist class and the
working class. The conflict is about the wealth generated by work in the
form of profits. Capitalists maximize their wealth by taking the
profits, leaving exploited workers in poverty. Marx predicted that this
conflict will ultimately lead to revolutions by workers against
capitalists.

Contemporary conflict theorists extend the conflict to be between
several social classes, not just the capitalists and workers. They also
include all other racial, ethnic, regional, and gender groups in the
analysis of conflict in society. However, the essence of conflict is on
the distribution of wealth in society.

The conflict theory analyzes how the capitalist class maintains its control over
societal resources through its control over the legislative and
executive branches of government. It achieves that control by sponsoring leaders of the ruling party or the alternating parties
(through directing donations to them),
who in return serve the interests of their capitalist benefactors.

Through the mass media, which they control by ownership in the
private sector or by their servants in the public sector, capitalists disseminate
their own ideology
among the masses of people. The ruled working poor classes then develop a
false consciousness of their class positions and their class interests.
They end up absorbing the capitalist ideology and adopting it as their
own. They end up voting for their capitalist exploiters. Even their unions become supportive of
the despotic capitalist regimes, hoping that
their standard of living will improve one day.
When this does not happen a decade after a decade and they find
themselves in abject poverty, then they revolt against their capitalist
oppressors.

The major tenets of the conflict theory is applicable to Arab
revolutions. There are exploitative wealthy ruling classes, which
control the masses of poor Arab workers through employment in the
private sector or through control in the public sector. The working
classes were tamed to accept their miserable conditions by measures of
the police state but when the level of poverty has become unbearable,
the masses of Arab impoverished workers revolted.

3.
The Power Elite Theory

In his book, "The Power Elite"
(1956), C. Wright Mills argued that the United States is ruled by three
groups of leaders. These are top business, military, and political
leaders. Though the first two groups are unelected, they exert influence
on the elected political leaders. The theory was developed on the
basis of data and observations related to the United States. However, it
is also applicable to other societies, including Arab societies in the
Middle East. The Bin Ali and Mubarak despotic regimes represented examples of this alliance
between the corrupt politicians and business leaders, who amassed vast
fortunes as a result of this alliance. The military and security
establishments backed that alliance in return for enjoying internal
privileges as well as being the major recipient of US-EU aid.

In the United States, the Power Elite
theory shows the top business leaders as the real rulers of
society. They influence the selection process of politicians through
their donations and their financial intervention in the political
process. In return, elected politicians (in the legislative and
executive branches of the government) pay their business patrons back by
using the US government's diplomatic, economic, financial, and military
resources to subjugate other nations to the wishes of the US
corporations.

The top military leaders work with
the military and security industries to develop the weapon systems,
technologies, and information systems, which maintain the American
hegemony world-wide. Their main job is to come up with a military budget
which enables them to guard the interests of the "American Empire"
world-wide, thus spending most of the US annual financial revenues to
maintain the US military bases, fleets, wars, as well as overt and
covert military and security operatiojns around the world.

4.
Empires and
Imperialism

Imperialism is the third stage of the
development of capitalism, after mercantilism and colonialism.
Mercantilism was represented by expeditions sponsored by European
merchants and kings to explore new routes and lands for trade, during
the
15th and 16th centuries. Colonialism represented establishing colonies
in the New World by the competing European colonial powers, in the 17th and
18th centuries.

When the colonies of the New World
started to get independence, the European colonial powers turned to
Africa and Asia to make fortunes through looting the raw materials,
buying agricultural products with low prices, and selling manufactured
commodities with high prices.

The imperialist stage of the
development of capitalism started during the 19th century, continued
throughout the 20th century, and even was rejuvenated by the NATO
invasion of the Middle East at the beginning of the 21st century.

With their advanced weapon systems,
they invaded the two continents after dividing them in treaties among
themselves in Europe. To achieve control over Asian and African nations,
the European imperialist powers
depended on professional military forces, which fought for money.

The European imperialist powers
started their invasion and occupation of Arab provinces of the Ottoman
Empire during 19th century, when France invaded and occupied most of
Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, and Mauritania. Spain invaded and occupied
parts of Morocco and the Western Desert. Britain invaded and
occupied the chiefdoms of the Western Coast of the Arabian Gulf. Italy invaded
and occupied Libya and part of Somalia at the beginning of the 20th
century. Finally, the rest of the Arab provinces of the Ottoman Empire
were invaded and occupied by the British and French imperialist powers
during World War I.

When the European Empires were
destroyed during World War II, the United States inherited the
their legacy becoming the World Western Empire, sharing world domination
with its rival, the Soviet
Empire in the East. When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1989, the
Soviet-satellite East
European states were swallowed by the European Union economically and by
NATO militarily.

The United States started launching its own wars around the
world to establish itself as the New World Empire (or New World Order).
This endeavor started with the Korean war, then the Vietnam War, the
first Gulf War over Kuwait, which resulted in the US occupation of the
Arabian Peninsula, the invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan, and the
so-called global "war on terror."

As a result of the imperialist stage of
the development of capitalism, the ruling classes in the capitalist
countries amassed vast fortunes. However, due to the rivalry and competition for resources and
domination,
all of the European empires collapsed during the two devastating world wars in the twentieth
century.

The American Empire is no exception.
The American capitalist class amassed vast fortunes. However, the US
federal government has sunk deep in debt, reaching more than $14
trillion at the beginning of 2011. The Empire has been a huge burden on
the shoulders of the American people, the tax-payers, and it's just a matter of time
until the Empire collapses, like its predecessors (
More About Empire Analysis ).

The Arab nation suffered from being
subjected to the previous European empires, the current American Empire,
and the overlapping and emerging Zionist Empire. Arab poverty resulted
from the imperialist exploitation, looting of their natural resources,
and selling them manufactured commodities with high prices.

5.
World System, Underdevelopment, and Dependency Theories

According to the World System theory
(Wallerstein), the world capitalist system has been divided into
three major regions and an external arena. These are the core
industrialized wealthy region, the semi-peripheral industrializing
region, and the exploited peripheral, least industrialized impoverished
region. The external arena may include parts of the world that cannot
fit in any of the three regions.

The poor Arab states may be
classified as part of the impoverished periphery, while oil-rich Arab
states are part of the external arena of this system in terms of
industrialization. However, they are active participants of the global
financial capitalist system because of the huge oil wealth amassed by
the ruling families and the capitalist classes in these states.

The core and the periphery have been
associated in an interdependent relationship. While the core needs raw
materials from the periphery, the latter needs manufactured commodities
and advanced technologies from the core. Thus, the developed core needs
the underdeveloped periphery, and in order for the core to continue its
development, the periphery has to continue as underdeveloped. It should
not be allowed to develop, as argued by Andre Gunder Frank.

This mutual economic dependency has
created mutual political dependency, too. Rulers of the core societies
depend on the rulers of the peripheral societies in enabling them to amass
vast fortunes through buying cheap raw materials from the periphery. In
return, the ruling families and their surrounding cronies enjoy
military, security, and diplomatic support from the ruling classes in
the core societies. This support enables them to amass fortunes on the
expense of the impoverished masses in the peripheral region.

The
1991 Gulf War was an example of
the dependency relationship between rulers of the
Arab states and the ruling classes in the US and Europe. The Bush
Sr. administration led a US-EU war against Iraq to force the Iraqi
forces out of Kuwait. The war led to the destruction of Iraq and
ultimately to the 2003 invasion and occupation of that Arab state.

The ruling classes in the US-EU
amassed vast fortunes as a result of consolidating their shares of the
global production and marketing of oil, and as a result of selling their
military hardware and their information systems to the military and
security establishments in the US-EU. In return, the ruling family of
Kuwait was restored to the throne, and actually to the ownership of the
chiefdom's oil wealth. The continuous US occupation of the Arabian
Peninsula ever since has assured protection of these royal families
against their domestic and external enemies.

6.
Neo-Imperialism (International debt & multi-national corporations)

Acknowledging the futility of
imperialist wars, and seeing new opportunities to generate wealth
without the brutal imperialist means of shedding blood, death, and destruction, capitalists started to
follow new methods such as granting loans to nations and receiving huge
amounts of interests on these loans to the extent that the indebted become
like their own slaves.

This neo-imperialist stage (which is
sometimes incorrectly referred to as neo-colonialism) has been
overlapped with the imperialist stage. Actually, they have been going
side by side for half a century, as an application to the frequently
heard threat, reiterated by the Israeli leaders and their followers in
NATO countries: "All options are on the table."
This means that if rulers of a nation-state accept the dictates of the
rulers of the Zionist Empire, particularly financial and economic
subordination, they will be safe and spared to loot their own nation as
they wish, as the case with most of the Arab dictatorial regimes.
However, if they do not accept subordination to the rulers of the
Zionist Empire, then they can be subdued by force through war, invasion,
and occupation (regime change), like the most recent case of Iraq, and
the possible future case of Iran.

The neo-imperialism perspective
applies the analysis of the social class conflict on the nation-state
level to a global conflict over wealth, between a global capitalist
class and the rest of humans on Planet Earth. Wealthy capitalists have
been enslaving not only poor nations in the Peripheral Third World but
also the Core industrial societies of the First World, as has been the
case with European societies and even the castle of capitalism, the
United States,
during the 2008-2010
period.

The United States federal government
is now heavily sunk in debt, $14 trillion at the beginning of 2011,
borrowed from capitalists everywhere, but mainly from the American
capitalist class, to finance the so-called "global war on terror." This
is in fact a capitalist global war for control of resources and
for protection of the headquarters of the Zionist Empire, the so-called
state of Israel.

In this stage of neo-imperialism,
nation-states have been losing control over their financial resources,
forced to borrow more from global capitalists, and gradually losing
their political and economic sovereignty to global capitalists.

Parallel to global financial
capitalism has been the emergence of multinational corporations, which
have no loyalty to nation-states. Rather, they work for themselves,
crossing the defunct political borders of these states, and controlling
resources, labor, and markets, as well as exerting influence inside
them.

Arab states have been active
participants in the neo-imperialist stage of capitalism. Poor states,
such as Egypt, Tunisia, Jordan, and Yemen, have lost their sovereignty
to the global financial institutions and multinational corporations. Aid
programs from the capitalist societies have been mainly used as bribes
to the security and military establishments, as a reward for their
participation in the neo-imperialist global "war or on terror." They
participated in the rendition program of torturing suspects, as
sub-contractors. They never stopped cracking down on the opposition, or
on any groups or individuals suspected of having aspirations for human
rights. They have turned Arab citizens into impoverished, helpless, and
hopeless masses of de facto slaves, so they will never rise up against
what rulers of the Zionist Empire have imposed on them.

For example, Egypt and Jordan, as
subordinate states without sovereignty, signed peace treaties with the
Zionist state of Israel, which usurped the heart of the Arab Homeland,
Palestine. Other Arab states have maintained secret relations with
Israel but some of them had open diplomatic or commercial ties with the
Zionist entity. It has become apparent that the supreme job for Arab
dictators is maintaining peaceful relations with the Israeli aggressors
by making sure that there are no individuals or groups in their states
who may oppose the racist, apartheid, Zionist regime and its dominance
on the Middle East region.

Rich Arab states, like those of the
Gulf Cooperation Council, have also been active participants in the
neo-imperialist stage by investing most of their wealth in the Core
societies, instead of investing it in the neighboring poor Arab states.
They have deposited hundreds of billions of dollars in international
banks, particularly in the US and the EU. Thus, the Arab oil wealth has
become under the control of the international financers, who lend to a
nation and deny lending to another, according to how much cooperation
they receive from the ruling elite in that nation.

Moreover, just like their European
counterparts, the Gulf states have relinquished their nation-state
sovereignty by becoming hosts to the military bases of NATO, the armed
forces of the Zionist Empire. The Gulf states functioned as the
launching pads for the NATO wars, invasion, and occupation of their Arab
brethren state of Iraq, in 1991 and 2003.

Conclusion

Arabs are in revolt
against the dictatorial regimes imposed on them by the rulers of the Zionist
Empire. All of these regimes have been backed and
supported by the US and EU governments for no other reasons than
keeping the
peace with Israel. The objective is to keep the Zionist state as the
dominant and hegemonic power in the oil-rich region.

As the Israeli hegemonic status in
Middle East is maintained, rulers of the Zionist Empire and their global
capitalist allies maintain their global control over resources, labor,
and markets, generating and amassing vast riches.

The backers of the Arab dictatorial regimes never cared about the
poor Arab masses or about how much repression and brutality are inflicted on them by
these regimes. To the contrary, US and EU governments cooperated and
collaborated with the dictatorial Arab regimes, providing them with the
military and security assistance, which enabled them to control Arabs for
decades. The result has been abject poverty, oppression, and horrendous
violation of all human rights.

Arabs are revolting for liberation,
freedom, social justice, and for their human dignity, indeed.

Statistics about
unemployment, in the above CIA Factbook table refer to jobless men who are
reported to the government. This does NOT include women, the overwhelming
majority of whom do NOT work. It is also noteworthy that dictatorial regimes
doctor their books and make up their own statistics for propaganda purposes.

Another inaccuracy in the numbers above is the Palestinian
population in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. The West Bank alone is the
home of more than 2.5 million Palestinians. The tiny little territory of
the Gaza Strip is inhabited by more than 1.5 million, making it the most
densely populated area in the world.

Because the Arab dictatorial regimes have been supported
by NATO countries for their peace with the Zionist state, it's important to
review the history of the Zionist invasion of the Arab Homeland, which is
inaccurately referred to as the "Israeli-Palestinian" conflict. The
sequence of events below show that the World Zionist leadership established
the Zionist state of Israel to be the headquarters of its global empire. The
US-EU governments have been forced by Israel-firsters to fund the Zionist
state, arm it to teeth, and even launch several wars, on its behalf in the
Middle East, to subjugate Arabs and Muslims to the hegemony of Israel in the
region.

The continuous Israeli wars on Arabs and Muslims since
1948 show that the conflict is not just a Palestinian-Israeli conflict over
Palestine, which has been stolen by Zionists with the force of arms. Rather,
it is more accurate to describe it as a Zionist invasion of the Middle East
for the purpose of subjugating Arabs and Muslims to the current global
Zionist Empire, and its headquarters, the State of Israel.

Sykes-Picot Agreement of 1916

Partition of the Arab Middle East Between the British and
French Empires

Stage 1

Up until 1946, the
Palestinian-Cana'anite Arab People had lived in Palestine from time
immemorial, before Abraham came to the Holy Land from Iraq. The land
was bordered by the Mediterranean in the West, and the River Jordan
in the East. More recently, they had lived comfortably alongside a
small but growing Jewish Community.

Stage 2

This was to change. Following the Balfour
Declaration of 1917, when the British Government stated its support
for the creation of a Jewish Homeland to be established in this
area. At the time Britain had the Mandate of Palestine, and asked
the newly formed UN to come up with a partition plan. A state for
the Jewish people, and a state for the Palestinians. In 1947, this
was what they came up with: 57% for a Jewish State.
43% for an Arab State.

In 1948 the British Mandate ended, they moved
out, and Israel declared Independence. The neighboring Arab States
came to the help of the Palestinian people. However, the Zionist
state of Israel gained control of 78% of
Palestine. Jordan held the West Bank and Egypt administered the Gaza Strip.
Jerusalem was divided. Israel had the West and Jordan the East.
Between 600,000 and 900,000
Palestinians were displaced and not allowed to return.

Stage 3

In1949 the Armistice line was agreed between
Israel and its neighbours, (Jordan, Egypt, Syria and Lebanon). This
is known as The Green Line.

In 1967 the Six Day War broke out in June when
Israel occupied the West Bank, Gaza Strip, Egyptian Sinai and Syrian
Golan Heights. UN Resolution 242 calls for withdrawal of Israeli
Troops from territories occupied during this war, back to the Green
Line.

Stage 4

Currently, what's left to the Palestinian people
is nothing more than the tiny territory of Gaza Strip, which is a de
facto prison of Palestinian refugees, as well as the scattered and isolated villages and
cities of the West Bank.

- 1897:The first World Zionist Conference
headed by Hirzel, decides to usurp Palestine from its inhabitants and give
it to Zionists.

- 1916:Signing the
Sykes-Picot agreement, which divided the Arab homeland between the British
and French empires, as the Ottoman empire was collapsing during World War I.
Other European powers, such as Italy which had occupied Libya already, was
informed about the agreement.

- 1917:British forces
occupied Palestine. The infamous British foreign minister, Balfour, promised
Zionist Rotschild British help to give Palestine to Zionists. This has
become known as the
Balfour Declaration.

- 1947:
The UN General
Assembly passes
Resolution 181 to
partition
Palestine, giving Zionists 56% of Palestine, though they only possessed
about 5% of the lands, and despite the fact they were half a million while
there were 1.3 million Palestinians.

- 1948:Israel was declared by Zionists, who
evicted Palestinians from their lands, the most infamous ethnic cleansing
in the 20th century. This forced population transfer created the Palestinian refugee problem,
which persists until today.

Zionists
also occupied and annexed more lands than the Partition Resolution gave
them. In particular, they annexed the Galilee in the north, Aujah in the
South, occupied West Jerusalem and the land corridor leading to it. This gave
them 78% of Palestine instead of the 56% given to them by the Partition
resolution.

The
annexation by force of 22% of Palestine made the Israeli government an
occupying force since its inception. It has adopted and maintained the
policy of acquisition of land and occupation ever since.

- 1948:
The UN General Assembly passed Resolution 194
calling for the
repatriation and compensation of Palestinian refugees.
Successive Israeli occupation governments never complied with this
resolution, which blocked any resolution of the Palestinian refugee problem
until today.

Expanding the
Zionist Israeli Aggression to Other Arab States, in Addition to the Palestinian
People

- 1956:
The Israeli occupation government participated with the British and French
imperialist governments in attacking Egypt, in what became known as the
Suez Canal War.

While the
British and French imperialist forces occupied the Suez Canal area, the
Israeli occupation government joined the imperialist camp by occupying the
Egyptian territory of the Sinai Peninsula
and the Palestinian territory of Gaza Strip.

President
Eisenhower
ordered the three aggressors to withdraw from the Suez Canal, Sinai, and
Gaza Strip. They did and that was the second time an American president
dared to confront the Israel Lobby.

The first
was President
Roosevelt, when he
refused to pressure the British government to allow 300,000 European Jews to
go to be repatriated in Palestine. He offered them to come to America
instead. As soon as he died, his successor, President Truman, adopted
the Zionist project as his own and asked the British to allow them entry to
Palestine.

- 1967:The Israeli
occupation imperialist government launch war on three neighboring Arab
states: Egypt, Jordan, and Syria, occupying Egyptian Sinai
again, the Syrian
Golan Heights, and
the two Palestinian territories of the West Bank
(which was under Jordanian rule) and Gaza Strip
(which was under Egyptian administration).

Zionists
rejoiced worldwide thinking that a major stage of their dream of an Israeli
Empire from the Nile to the Euphrates was achieved.

The US
entered the conflict forcefully, siding with the victor, providing the
Israeli occupation imperialist government everything it needed to control
the occupied Arab territories and the Palestinian people in the occupied
territories of the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

Estimates
of the US military,
economic, and financial aid to the Israeli
occupation imperialist government range between $147 billion and $1.5
trillion. The latter
figure is more likely if indirect aid is included, particularly tax-free
donations to religious charitable organizations and investment of pension
and retirement funds in Israeli companies and projects.

Moreover,
successive US administrations have shielded the Israeli occupation
imperialist government from any UN measures or sanctions by using the US
Veto against any anti-Israeli resolution, weakening the UN to the level of
helplessness.

Without
this tremendous US support for the Israeli occupation imperialist
government, the Israeli occupation of the Arab territories and oppression of
the Palestinian people could have ended a long time ago.

- 1968:
Israeli occupation forces attacked Al-Karamah
area on the east bank of the River Jordan, in an attempt to crush the
Palestinian resistance movement. The battle was a victory for the resistance
and increased recruitment in the resistance ranks.

- 1973:
Egypt and Syria
launched their counter attack to restore their territories from the Israeli
occupation imperialist government. The US intervened shielding Israel from
military defeat. Ultimately, President Carter
succeeded in making a peace treaty between Egypt and Israel (1978),
leading to the return of Sinai to Egypt in return for Egypt to get out of
the conflict.

Syria did
not get its territory back because the Israelis wanted to change the
borderline to deny Syria access to the eastern side of the Tabaria Lake (Sea
of Galilee). The same Israeli condition has persisted until today.

- 1978:
Israeli occupation forces attacked and occupied south Lebanon
to crush the Palestinian resistance movement there. They failed but
established military bases in south Lebanon and stayed there until Hizbullah
resistance fighters forced them out on June 2000.

- 1982:
Israeli occupation forces invade Lebanon, including the capital Beirut. The
objective was to drive the PLO resistance fighters outside Lebanon. The
invasion was successful and PLO fighters were dispersed throughout the
Middle East.

b) The
Israeli Occupation Regime: Blunt Slavery and Subjugation of the Palestinian
People

- 1987
(December): The first
Palestinian Uprising (Intifadha)
against the Israeli occupation started. It continued until 1993. The Israeli
leaders realized that there was no military solution to the
Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

- 1993:
Israeli Prime
Minister, Yitzhak Rabin, and Chairman of the PLO, Yasser Arafat, signed the
Oslo Agreement in the presence of the US President, Bill Clinton, in the
White House. The agreement allowed the PLO fighters to return to the
occupied Palestinian territories of the West Bank and Gaza. The agreement
also specified that the end outcome of the Israeli-Palestinian negotiations
would be the establishment of a Palestinian state in 1999.

Yitzhak
Rabin was assassinated to stop the peaceful resolution of the
Israeli-Palestinian conflict. His successors did not continue the path of
peace. They played every trick in the book to avoid the establishment of the
agreed upon Palestinian state. Peres, Netanyaho, and Barak all followed this
policy.

- 2000:
The Palestinian people realized that the Israeli occupation government was
not sincere, playing games to maintain the occupation indefinitely. They
revolted against the Israeli occupation again in what became known as the
second Uprising
(second Intifadha),
which extended from 2000 to 2005.

Thousands
of Palestinians and hundreds of Israelis were killed, tens of thousands of
Palestinians were injured, their homes were destroyed, all in front of the
whole world through television screens.

- 2001:
The US invaded Afghanistan, as a reaction to the September 11 attacks.

- 2003:
The US and the UK invaded and occupied Iraq, though it nothing to do with
September 11 attacks. This got Israel rid of the strongest Arab enemy state.

- 2004
(November): Elected Palestinian President, Yasser Arafat, dies in his office
prison, in Ramallah. Many Palestinians believe he was assassinated by the
Israelis. He was imprisoned in his own office, surrounded by besieging
Israeli occupation forces because he refused to sell out and sign on a phony
Palestinian state.

- 2005
(September): The Israeli occupation forces were forced to leave Gaza Strip
by resistance, as they were forced to leave south Lebanon.

Mahmoud
Abbas was elected as the second president of the Palestinian Authority, the
Palestinian government under Israeli occupation.

- 2006
(January): Palestinian parliamentary
elections were held,
supervised by international observers. Prominent among these was President
Jimmy Carter
and the Carter Center. Carter and all observers announced that the elections
were democratic, transparent, and fair.

The
Palestinian Islamic Resistance Movement, Hamas, won an overwhelming majority
of seats in the Palestinian parliament.

The Israeli
occupation government expressed its displeasure and decided to punish the Palestinian people
for electing Hamas.
The US-EU government followed the Israeli lead right away, as usual.

The
Palestinian people were isolated, border crossings were closed, financial
relations were severed, revenues were withheld, and even financial
assistance from Arab and Muslim countries was not allowed to reach them.

- 2007:
A short confrontation between Fateh and Hamas in Gaza resulted in the defeat
of Fateh-loyal security forces. Hamas became the only party dominating
government in Gaza. Fateh became the only party dominating the West Bank.

The Gaza
Strip now is the largest prison in the world.
About 1.5 million people cannot leave it, cannot receive financial aid from
Arab and Islamic governments, most of them are unemployed living on the UN
handouts.

-
2008-2009: On
December 2008 and January 2009, the Israeli occupation terrorist forces
launched a war on Gaza Strip in order to change the elected Palestinian
government there but failed in doing so. However, they succeeded in killing
about 1,400 Palestinians, most of whom were women and children, using all
weapons they had short of nuclear weapons.

The Gaza
Strip conditions now have made the Warsaw Ghetto, during World War II, a
little story.

Dr. Hassan El-Najjar is the Editor of Al-Jazeerah & CCUN.

==============================

References:

(1) References about the spark which started the Arab revolution of 2011,
the suicidal protest act of Muhammed Al-Bu'azizi and two other youngmen in
Sidi Buzaid, Tunisia can be found at: